President Obama remarks on Egypt in February 2011 after President Mubarak stepped down. In 3 sentences: The speech provides background on Obama and the history of protests in Egypt leading to Mubarak resigning. Obama acknowledges the privilege of witnessing history and says Egyptians demanded universal rights over recent weeks. He praises the peaceful protests and says Egypt will never be the same, while assistance will be provided for the transition.

1. University Utara Malaysia
Faculty of Arts and Sciences
MODERN ENGLISH LINGUISTICS
“Analysis of President Obama Remarks on Egypt”
by samer yaqoob (822524)
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2. 1. Introduction
2. History of the speech
3. Background knowledge to context
A. culture
B. Interpersonal
C. referring to context
4. co-text
A. Anaphora
5. The cooperative principles
A. Observing maxims
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3. Introduction
 Barack Obama - Childhood and Education:
 Obama was born on August 4, 1961 in, Hawaii. He moved to Jakarta in 1967 where he
lived for four years.
 At the age of 10, he returned to Hawaii and was raised by his maternal grandparents.
 After high school he attended first Occidental College and then Columbia University
where he graduated with a degree in political science.
 Career Before the Presidency:
 Upon graduating from Columbia University, Barack Obama worked first at Business
International Corporation and then at the New York Public Interest Research Group, a
non-partisan political organization.
 Then, he moved to Chicago and became director of the Developing Communities
Project. He worked as a community organizer along with teaching constitutional law at
the University of Chicago Law School for twelve years.
 He also worked as a lawyer during this same period. In 1996, Obama was elected to be
the junior senator from Illinois.
 Barack Obama now
 On November 4, 2008, Barack Obama was elected as the 44th president of the United
States. He officially became the first African-American president
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4. History of speech
 President Obama Remarks on Egypt
1. Place :
 THE WHITE HOUSE, Office of the Press Secretary
2. Time :
 February 11, 2011
3. Occasion :
President Mubarak, stepping down
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5. Background knowledge context
CULTURE
EGYPT is a big country in the middle east , Egyptians had a great revolution .
Egyptian people's were in hunger for change .
In the given speech, the president (Obama ) starts his speech saying:
“There are very few moments in our lives where we have the privilege to witness
history taking place. This is one of those moments. This is one of those times. The
people of Egypt have spoken, their voices have been heard, and Egypt will never be
the same. ”
So , the speaker and audiences share with the same knowledge about an important
transition happening in Egypt.
Interpersonal: specific and possible private knowledge about the speaker.
In the given speech, the speaker said
“we have the privilege to witness history taking place . President”
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6.  Culture
 The president addressed “everybody” which is
meant to convey the people of the whole world,
who heard his speech. The people of the whole
world witnessed the transition took place in
Egypt and they were well aware of that, so the
speaker President Obama and the audience. i.e.
the people of the whole world share the same
knowledge.
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7. Referring in the context
Using language to refer to entities in the context
We can see some examples of reference in the given speech.
1. Personal deixis:
A. I’m sure there will be difficult days ahead.
The personal pronoun “I” refers to the president Obama.
B. We stand ready to provide whatever assistance is necessary.
The personal pronoun “we” refers to American people.
C. People demanded their universal rights.
The personal pronoun “their ” refers back to Egyptians .
on the basis of the pervious paragraph when Obama said “Egypt has
played a pivotal role in human history for over 6,000 years. ”
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8.  I am sure there will be difficult days ahead. Here, ‘I’
refers to the president Barak Obama.
 Volunteers checking protesters to ensure that they
were unarmed-in this phrase, the pronoun ‘they’
means the protesters who protested against the
regime of Mubarak.
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9. Referring in the context
2. Place deixis : words can be used to point to location. Such as , this ,
her , and so on .
In the given speech, we can notice many place deixis examples.
 The place ‘Tahrir’ means the place where the protesters
gathered in thousands to protest against the regime of
Mubarak, but here the place signifies something else-as the
President Barak Obama aptly mentions that the word
Tahrir means liberation.
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10. Referring in the context
3. Time deixis:
such as,
A. In the sentences ‘This is one of the times’, the word
‘times’ means the transition period taking place in the
history of Egypt. It signifies that the history is in the
making and the rule of Mubarak is over and new
regime will take over the governance of Egypt.
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11.  For Egyptians have made it clear that nothing less than
genuine democracy will carry the day. In the above
sentence, the word ‘day’ has been used as reflection of
true democracy which is in the process of making.
 Egypt has played a pivotal role in the human history
for over 6000 years. The mentioned ‘years’ identifies
the development took place in the history of Egypt
from time immemorial.
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12.  Over the last few weeks, the wheel of history turned a
blinding pace as the Egyptian people demanded their
universal rights. In the above sentence, ‘few weeks’
means the protesting going on by the protesters in
Tahirir Square.
 Today belongs to the people of Egypt—in this sentence
‘today’ means the aftermath of ousting Mubarak’s
usurpation from his authoritarian regime.
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13. Co-text
 Based on co-text feature, there are many features
derived from co-text. Such as,
 1. Anaphora : in the given speech, the president uses
many anaphora examples. such as.
 We stand ready to provide whatever assistance is
necessary. In the above sentence, the word ‘we’ stand
for the United States.
 We saw mothers and fathers carrying their children on
their shoulders to show them what true freedom look
like. In the above sentence the word, ‘them’ means the
children of the protesting parents.
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14. The co-operative principles:
 Observing maxims include
 Quantity maxims :
 Relational maxims:
 Maxim of manner:
Relational maxims: The speaker (The president Obama)
is assumed to be saying that is relevant to what has
been said before. He relates the incidents taking place
in Egypt and his audience is fully aware of that.
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15.  Maxim of manner. In the given speech, (Obama)
tries to be brief and avoid obscurity and ambiguous in
his speech.
 He mentions very simply that this is one of those
moments. This is one of those times. These are the
sentences can be mentioned out of his many lucid
speeches.
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16. syntax features
 Examples:
He mentions about a young Egyptian quoting, “For the
first time in my life, I really count. My voice is heard.
Even though I’m only one person, this is the way real
democracy works.”
from syntax view, it not easy to analyze the sentences or
to draw tree diagram .
we can notice that the speaker uses many compound
words. Such as, for the first time in my life.
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17. References
 Leech, G. (1983). Principles of pragmatics: Longman
Pub Group.
 http://americanhistory.about.com
 www.youtube.com
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